In the two-room flat where I live in Japan, I try to take time every day to step away from the bombardment of e-mails and opportunities and papers around my desk, for an hour, and just sit on our 30-inch terrace in the sun, reading something sustaining, whether 'The Age of Innocence' or the latest by Colm Toibin.
Interpretation
This quote emphasizes the importance of taking time for oneself amidst life's distractions.
Pico Iyer reflects on the necessity of carving out moments of solitude and reflection in our fast-paced, distraction-filled lives. By choosing to spend time in the sun with a good book, he illustrates a mindful approach to living, suggesting that nurturing our inner selves is essential for overall well-being and clarity.
In practice
Sharing this quote during a meditation workshop to emphasize the importance of personal time.
Quitting, for me, means not giving up, but moving on; changing direction not because something doesn’t agree with you, but because you don’t agree with something. It’s not a complaint, in other words, but a positive choice, and not a stop in one’s journey, but a step in a better direction. Quitting-whether a job or a habit-means taking a turn so as to be sure you’re still moving in the direction of your dreams.
I think one reason, obviously, that I spend so much time in one place is that I've been lucky enough to travel a lot, and now there are other different, invisible trains that are more interesting to me.
I've never meditated in my life. I don't practice yoga nor any religion. I'm a tourist on the realm of stillness.
We travel to open our hearts and eyes and learn more about the world than our newspapers will accommodate.
I'm no Buddhist monk, and I can't say I'm in love with renunciation in itself, or traveling an hour or more to print out an article I've written, or missing out on the N.B.A. Finals. But at some point, I decided that, for me at least, happiness arose out of all I didn't want or need, not all I did.
The one thing perhaps that technology hasn't always given us is a sense of how to make the wisest use of technology.
The mill wheel turns, it turns forever, though what is uppermost remains not so.
For after the Battle comes quiet.
People are not ants or bees. We do not reason or love or live or die collectively.
He that Opposes his own Judgment against the Current of the Times, ought to be back'd with unanswerable Truths; and he that has that Truth on his Side, is a Fool, as well as a Coward, if he is afraid to own it, because of the Currency or Multitude of other Mens Opinions.
People don't seem to understand that the separation of powers is not about the power of these branches; it's there to protect individual liberty - it's there to protect us from the concentration of power.
Before God we are all equally wise - and equally foolish.
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